


Fix You

by Helen8462



Category: Star Trek: Discovery
Genre: Blindness, F/M, Friendship, Guilt, Revenge, Sex, Survival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-06
Updated: 2018-01-06
Packaged: 2019-03-01 04:10:51
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,561
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13286706
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Helen8462/pseuds/Helen8462
Summary: “I’d rather defend you, than give your eulogy.”What happens in the days after Gabriel makes the worst decision of his life.





	Fix You

**Author's Note:**

  * For [MiaCooper](https://archiveofourown.org/users/MiaCooper/gifts).



> This fic is a late Christmas present for my very good friend and dedicated, ruthless beta, Mia Cooper. Without her... Well, writing wouldn't be nearly as fun.
> 
> A bouquet of thanks to killermanatee for her beta services and helping me brainstorm/listening to me complain.

* * *

When you lose something you can't replace  
When you love someone, but it goes to waste  
Could it be worse?  
  
Lights will guide you home  
And ignite your bones  
And I will try to fix you

_-Coldplay,['Fix You'](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aK3TROzVRiE)_

* * *

**_Him_**

The first thing he hears is her voice. 

Behind the thick curtain of sedation, he can’t tell if she’s an hallucination or the harbinger of death itself.  So he lies in wait, eyes clenched shut and breathing shallow until he’s sure.  A moment later, he is.

It’s her.

His ears, the fog in his mind, they’re clearing now.  His eyes, however, are not.  All he sees is a blanket of black, glowing bright around the edges, a harsh reality which does not surprise him in the least.

His stomach lurches forward as the memory returns at warp speed.  Ninety-seven souls, extinguished in the inferno he created just for them.

It can’t be true.  He didn’t…  He wouldn’t have…

Mind in overdrive, he works hard to bring himself back to the present. With nothing visual to focus on he has to make a choice.  Muffled voices, the smell of antiseptic, the throbbing in his leg, or the feel of a rough sheet bunched in his fists.

He chooses to focus on her.  Her voice is like a gift to his perfectly undamaged ears.

She’s speaking with someone - on the other side of the room, perhaps - and he’s pretty sure that neither of them realize he’s awake.

For a moment he wishes he wasn’t and continues to lie still, maintaining the illusion a while longer for everyone’s sake.  But soon his body betrays a twitch which shudders against his still broken leg.  He can’t help the groan that escapes.

“Gabriel?” he hears, and his jaw clamps shut.

“I don’t understand,” another, deeper voice says and he hears the footsteps coming closer.  “He should still be out cold.”

“Captain Lorca has always been too stubborn to stay anesthetized. I told you to double the dose.”

He turns his head toward the voices, but his attempt to sit upright ends in another audible wince.  His leg has been immobilized; the rest of his aching muscles are grateful for the forced reprieve, but he feels trapped.  Blind in a box.

Adrenaline surges through him, he is hot and queasy and trembling.  He is deserving of nothing, he knows, but he prays for some kind of relief.

As if reading his mind, she presents him with an undue reward as she wraps her hand around his.  He’d know her cool, slender fingers anywhere and right now, he couldn’t fight the urge the grip her for dear life if he tried.

“I’ll put him back out,” the masculine voice says.

“No,” she imparts sternly and he moans the word at the same time.

He can all but see the small smile this would have brought to her face. 

“You’re alright, Gabriel,” she reassures.  “You’ve been rescued and you’re being treated.” 

He appreciates that she doesn’t try to remind him of who she is.  Her presence by his side is a given and needs no explanation.

“Where?” His mouth is dry.

“On the _Hudson_.”

“How soon until you can fix my eyes?”

A pause and she releases a sigh.  The deeper of the two voices responds, “Captain Lorca, my name is Doctor Reyna.  I’ve been treating you.  There has been considerable damage done to your retinas, but we’re not sure of the exact cause.  Can you tell me, were you exposed to a high-intensity laser or other kind of close-range flash of light?”

“I think we can get into the cause of his injuries later, Doctor,” she says smartly before he can shut the man up himself.  _She knows,_ he thinks.  _Of course she does._ _But she hasn’t told anyone._

“As I was saying, with this particular kind of injury we have several options for treatment.”  The doctor is no longer facing him, his voice has waned in another direction.  “Unfortunately, I don’t have many of them at my disposal on this ship, nor am I an appropriately trained ophthalmologist.  My best advice is to get him to Starfleet Medical, once his leg is finished, that is.”

“I’m still here.”

The doctor clears his throat.  “Of course, Captain.”

“Thank you for your help,” she says.  “That will be all, for now.”  And then footsteps carry the man away.  

Her hand tightens once again around his own, while another is – quite expectedly – placed on his chest.  Out of instinct he looks down at where he would otherwise be able to see her pale flesh against the dark undershirt that he assumes he’s still wearing. 

“You and I will take a transport back to Earth tomorrow, Gabriel.”

“Not on my account, I hope.” 

She moves away, not far, and a moment later he feels a cup pressed into his palm.  Gratefully he drinks down the cool water.

“No, on mine.  I’m due back at headquarters.  And you’re going to have a lot of questions to answer.”

“So you swung out to the edges of Federation territory just to pick me up?”  She takes back the empty cup.  “Great doctor you’ve got on this ship, by the way.  He seems very confident in his abilities.”

“He’s young.  He’s trying to help you.  So am I.”

“Are we alone?”

Another pause.  “Yes.”

As if a window were opened to a brisk day, the atmosphere of the room changes in an instant.  He waits a moment and feels her breath betray a slight tremor.  He’s suddenly cold.

“Did you recover them?”

She swallows loud enough to make his ears ring.  “Some.  The rest were… irretrievable.”

 _Irretrievable._   It is her kind way of saying ‘torn limb from limb and lost to the vastness of space.’

She slides closer to him, her warmth and weight leaning against his mattress.  Her hand finds its way across his brow and he winces at the memory of a laceration.  “What happened?”

“What did you find?” he counters, carefully.

“Debris consistent with a warp-core overload.  The remains of your crew and an unknown number of Klingons.  And you, unconscious in a pod, two hours shy of asphyxiation.”

“How long ago was that?”

“I don’t see how –“

“When did you find me, Katrina?”

“Six hours ago.”

 _Six hours, plenty of time.  Everyone knows.  The families know…_ The knot in his chest ties tighter, his head feels light.

“Gabriel, I’m here as your friend, but I punched my admiral’s ticket to get to you.  I have to report back, and soon.  There were no logs to recover either from the wreckage, or your pod.  You’re the only one who knows what happened.”

“Not here,” he insists.  “I’ll tell you everything but not here.”

“You can’t leave sickbay until your leg has healed.”

“Then you’re going to have to wait.”

“If you have information about the Klingons –”

“I don’t,” he spits. “They came out of nowhere.”

“There are families waiting to hear about their loved ones,” she persists. 

He feels anger and shame rising within him.  “They’re all dead, what more do they need to hear?”

Her weight releases the cushion.

“I’ll be back when you’re ready to talk.”

He figures that’s all there is to this conversation, the sound of her footfalls grow softer as she moves away.  She’s leaving him alone, in the dark with his transgressions.

He believes she is gone, a stillness has returned to the room. 

Then, from across the bay, he hears the words which will ring in his memory, the ones that will keep him going for the remainder of many difficult days to come.

“I’m glad you’re okay.”

* * *

His eventual confession, given in the dark to a silent witness, feels more like a prison sentence than an absolution of sins.  The weight that rests on his shoulders grows heavier as he tells of how he made the decision to destroy everything he had worked so hard to protect.  There is no freedom from ever-present guilt as he describes in vivid detail every step, and every failure that led him to this time and place.  

He understands that he has earned the titles of both survivor and deserter.

Still, he knows better than to tell her everything, because while his trust runs deep, he’d rather lie than put her career at risk – or his.  And so, he keeps to the facts – leaves out the motivations – it’s safer that way.

Truth be told, he’d expected more comfort from his confessor.  Being unable to read her expressions feels like the worst kind of punishment.  He tries to imagine sympathy in her uneven breath, but instead senses her unease when she shifts in her seat.  When he has nothing left to reveal, there is a moment of silence.  

“Is it my turn now?” she asks quietly, as if she needs his permission to speak.    

He nods.

“When we received the _Buran’s_ distress call, I feared the worst,” she begins, and he hears the slightest hitch in her voice.  He can imagine her posture from years spent in her company; she’s slouched forward in her chair, hands folded as if in prayer in front of her lips, elbows resting on her thighs.  

“It took me seventeen hours to get to you.  There wasn’t one single minute that went by when I wasn’t thinking about you dead, or… worse.  And then, we arrive.  And there’s nothing left.”

He hears her lick her lips, it’s something she does when she’s trying to keep from crying.

“Your com-beacon wasn’t functioning.  We didn’t know you survived.  For an hour I was alive, and you were not.” 

She sits back now, he hears the rustle of fabric.  “I am an admiral.  I am supposed to care about all lives equally.  But I couldn’t, Gabriel.  All I could think was that I’d never see my dearest friend again.  Never share another drink.  Never beat you at another game of chess.  Never…” she trails off.

“And now?” he asks, fearing her answer more than he feared execution at the hands of the Klingons.

“Now, I have to try to defend your actions.  I have to reconcile my personal feelings with your questionable leadership decisions.”

“If it’s worth anything, I’m sorry that I put you in this position.  I know things would be easier if I were dead.”

There is a pause.  It’s not uncomfortable, time simply hangs a moment while she forms the words he longs to hear.

“I’d rather defend you, than give your eulogy.”

* * *

**_Her_**

It is late when she finally returns to her apartment, a week since she rescued Gabriel.  The darkness past her window mirrors the way she feels about this war and her role in it.  It’s been another day filled with bleak strategy sessions, briefings, and mounting losses.  All she wants is a hot bath, a hot meal and to sleep until it’s all over. 

In the lateness of the hour, she has almost – _almost_ – forgotten that he is staying in her spare bedroom.  She’s half-undressed, on her way for that well-deserved soak in the tub, when she hears a voice from the other room.  Concerned, she pads softly to the doorway, a robe wrapped around her just in case there is an unexpected guest.  A creak in the floorboards betrays her presence.

“Dennison, D’Trag, Ekaa, Emmory…”

He’s sitting with his face to the corner, his bare back is lit only by the moonlight streaming through the doorway. 

“Ericks, Fitzgerald…”

It’s when he speaks the name “Greyson” with a stumble and a pause to the otherwise regular cadence that she realizes what he’s doing. 

“Greyson was my first officer,” he says, a decibel softer than the certainty with which he had been reciting names of the dead.  “He covered me while I got to the self-destruct console.  Took a blade to the chest.”

“I didn’t know that,” she admits softly.

“Now you do.”  A pause, then, “Haroulis, Indujaa, Jemis, Jarrell…”

And she makes her way quietly back to her bath.

* * *

The next day they’re having a hasty breakfast when he pauses mid-bite and looks to his left. 

“What is it?”

“Nothing,” he replies, shaking his head.  “I thought I heard something.”

“It’s just us,” she reassures.  She sips the last of her cup of coffee and returns her attention to the padd she’d been reading.

“I have a psych evaluation today,” he says, fumbling for the fork.  “Dr. Hagarty.  You know him?”

She nods then remembers to speak her response.  “Yes.  Michael is a friend of mine.”

“Anything I should know?”

“Tell him the truth.  You won’t do yourself, or Starfleet, any favors by lying.”

“No lying, got it.  Great advice.”

She pushes back from the table, realizing that she’s almost late.

“Kat?”

“Hm?” She pulls on her uniform jacket and sweeps her hair from the collar.

“Am I a murderer?”

His blatant question makes her freeze. 

“I… No.” she stumbles, unsure of how to remove herself from the trap he’s laid.  “You are a captain who made a very difficult decision and you did what you thought was best.  That doesn’t make you a murderer.”

“Is it what you would have done?”

His pointed question hangs in the air.  “I wasn’t there,” she says finally.  “It’s impossible for me to speculate.”

“You know what happened.  What would you have done?” he presses.

The truth is that she’s been over this question in her mind constantly since she learned what happened, and the truth is:  “I would have self-destructed the ship,” she says finally.  “Starfleet order two-zero-zero-five.  You couldn’t let the _Buran_ fall into enemy hands.”

“But?”

She sighs, here’s the rub.  “But I wouldn’t have left.”

“There it is,” he stands abruptly, nearly knocking over his glass of juice.  “I’m not a murderer, I’m a coward.”

“I didn’t say that either, Gabriel.  I’m not judging you for your actions.  I’m just telling you that in the same situation I think – and I can’t ever really know – but I think I would have stayed.”

“I didn’t leave because I was afraid to die, Katrina.  I escaped so that I could exact revenge.  So I could bring the Klingons to their knees.  Starfleet needs me.  I’m more valuable alive than dead.” He pounds a fist onto the table and now the juice does spill. 

She watches the liquid pool and drip to the floor.

“I’ve told you,” she says calmly, “I’m glad you’re alive.  No matter the reason.”

“I left because I have something to prove.  I have to make amends for my crew.”  He takes his breaths through clenched teeth.

“I know that, too.”

“I left because…” he stops cold, vacant eyes darting.

“Because why?” she asks softly.

“Because I owe it to them.  I owe it to the ones I failed.  I have to win this war.  I have to make them pay.”

“ _You_ have to win this war?” she asks, reaching for his arm but then letting her hand fall back down as she reigns herself in. She wants so badly to help him, to warn him, to tell him that if he so much as breathes that he’s in this for personal revenge he won’t see the inside of a ship again at least until the war is over.  But she can’t. 

She’s not his advisor or even his therapist.  And for all of their history and all of their oddly-defined love, she cannot coach him.  Her first duty is to Starfleet.

She squares her shoulders and says, “Good luck today, Gabriel.  I’ll see you when I get home.”

* * *

Four days later, she finds him in his bedroom, shirt off, doing pushups against the floor as if it were his enemy. 

His ass is tight in nothing but boxer briefs, not a bad sight in the least, but she quickly averts her eyes.  It feels wrong somehow to be looking at him this way; despite impropriety, her mind replays the many nights – and days – they’ve shared before, when everything was simpler somehow. 

She returns her gaze to his body.  His back is tense, muscle straining, it’s an involuntary reflex for her to lick her lips. 

“Are you going to just stand there and stare?” he asks, huffing as he continues to push against the floor.  She can see now that he’s smiling.

“I guess there’s nothing wrong with your ears.”

He grunts, smoothly letting himself down again, then up.  She’s now focused on his biceps.

“I’m glad to see you’re staying in shape.”

“Not much else to do.  I got tired of listening to the self-help books.  Have you heard the news?”

“I heard that you passed your first round of evals, yes.  But you know there are more to come.”

“I’ll knock them out of the park, too,” he assures, grunting and pushing up and down again.

“It’s not about knocking them out,” she admonishes him.  “It’s about healing, and being fit for duty.”

A pang of worry that he might fool his way into the center seat nags at the back of her throat.  When he chooses to ignore her last statement, she changes the subject.  “How was your appointment with the specialist?”

He stops and pushes up one last time to sit on his haunches.  His blank gaze in her general direction sends a surge of anxiety through her.  She finds the way he focuses a few degrees left of her shoulder unnerving, when in the past he’d always looked at her head on with such certainty – such ownership.

“They’re giving me another week.”

“And then?”

“Then, if there’s still no progress we’re going to talk again about a transplant.”

“I don’t see why you won’t –“

“Just agree to the surgery and get it over with.  Yes, I know, Kat.  You’ve said it a dozen times before.”  He feels for the side of the bed, then pulls himself up and sits down on it. 

“I don’t have to agree with your decision to respect it,” she reminds.  “I’d just like to know.”

He pats the space next to him and she draws closer, warily.  She doesn’t really expect him to admit what she knows to be true, that he’s hanging on to this pain as a reminder.  Forever-damaged eyes will be his albatross.

She watches his expression change in just the way she expected it would, eventually.

“You know what I’d like to know?”  He moves a hand onto her leg.  “I’d like to know how I’ve been sharing your apartment for a week and not your bed.”

His question hangs in the air and for a moment she actually feels relieved.  This is the Gabriel she remembers, the one she’s comfortable with.  This is what she’s been waiting for. 

This is what she has been missing.

What she can’t be sure of is whether his come on is just another ruse, or if he’s really making strides.

In an instant, she decides that she doesn’t care.  She’s tired of agonizing over the changes in him and has had her fill of death and war.  Deep down she knows that this isn’t what he truly needs to heal, but, it might be what she needs.

Affection, pleasure, normalcy.

Even if for just one night, it has to be a step in the right direction.

* * *

**_Him_**

His hand is still resting on her thigh, waiting for an answer to his lingering question. 

“As you know, this is an interior bedroom, Gabriel,” she says, and within her words are a promise.  He releases a breath.  “There are no windows.”  She rises and his fingers fall back to the comforter.

Her feet brush against the hard carpeting, the door closes, then her steps grow silent as she moves onto the plush throw rug at the foot of his bed.  “Computer, lights off.”

The faint halo around the edge of his nearly non-existent vision disappears and he is plunged into total darkness yet again.  As he rises to meet her, he perceives just a spot of soft green glow.  “You forgot –“

“Computer, turn off the chronometer,” she orders.

The glow disappears.  

“So we’re equal now?  Is that the point of this?”  He’s smirking, and he knows she can hear it.

He perceives her move away, toward the dresser, then anticipates the click of metal hitting wood.  When the sound is made, he can’t help but smile for having been right. 

“Now, we’re equal.”

“Ah, but you’re still wearing too much,” he knows.  “Unless that was pinned to your skin.”

“Impatient, are we?”

He’s sure that she just heard him swallow.  There’s no hiding the raggedness of his breath or the pounding of his own heart which reverberates, making it hard to concentrate.  And he tries so very hard to concentrate.  This is her.  This is them.  Same as always. Nothing has changed.

He follows the sound of the zipper as it frees her from further confines.  He waits for footfalls to bring her back to him, needs to hear her approaching like a man in the desert needs water.  

When she helps his fingertips find her skin, she feels like forgiveness. 

Her jacket is discarded onto the floor, dropped low from one hand as his lips remember a trail from her shoulder down her naked arm. 

All of his senses are hyper-attuned, even more so knowing that she’s been blinded too.  In the dark, they dance, stripping each other bare in more than just one meaning of the phrase.  Each caress is a pardon, each kiss an apology, each breath a reminder to make the most of what they have - right now, right here.

The familiarity of _them_ comes back as a wave crashing onto the shore.

Clothes shed, inhibitions gone, his desire for her rises impatient and urgent.  She tempers him by sliding a hand down his chest, his abs, settling into the well of his hips.  It’s just enough contact to express her desire while maintaining control.  He remembers to breathe.

A moment later, all bets are off as her lips and tongue follow the same downward path and he almost shouts from the contact.

Those cool, slender fingers – the same ones that greeted him when he woke into an unending nightmare – now wrap his length with such confidence he’d swear she owns him.  He feels her shuffle lower, her breath leaving a trail that makes him shudder.  For a moment, he can see her beautiful mouth as she opens wide to take him in.  Blissful heat surrounds him, urging him in time with her hands gripping his thighs, he weaves his fingers through her silky hair and thanks her with an unintelligible sob.  The sounds of her are unlike anything he’s noticed before.  They’re obscene and it’s exactly what he needs to hear.

His eyes are squeezed tight out of reflex and after he thrusts involuntarily, she pushes back.

He guides her gently up, he’s had enough of her being in command.  His strong hands drag possessively against her curves and she moans a portion of his name when his mouth fits around her breast.  His hair is pulled, his scalp scraped as she encourages him to continue his ministrations.

As if he needed further encouragement.

The same inescapable gravity which has kept them together all these years drags them downward onto the bed.  His lips blaze a trail down from the center of her chest past the soft skin of her belly and to her waiting center.  She moans and grasps at his hair and he pushes her thighs apart, settling between them. 

Everything about her is familiar and right.  He feels at home here, between her folds.  His tongue urges her on, his senses of taste and smell and sound amplified now.  He relishes in her pleasure as it is directly connected to his own.

She clenches and moans around him.  Then she says in that soft, graveled voice that he always has to work for, “I need you, Gabriel.  Now…” She gasps.  “Please.”

He moves on top of her and enters her slowly, almost reverently, though she’s impatient and pulling at him, her urgency clearly greater than his own.  He holds her steady and firm, showing her that he’s not so damaged as to give up complete control.  This will be at his pace.

He can tell the moment she stops trying to lead.

Buried deep within her body, forehead to forehead, then lips crashing together and sharing breath, he gives as much as he takes.  Subconsciously he counts her shudders and sighs, savors every sound.  He owns each response she gifts him; the shouting of his name, the experience of her ragged exhale against his ear.  The intoxicating scent of their passion.  The way her skin feels, slick and hot.

He commits it all to memory for when she is gone and all he has is the dark.

* * *

When they are spent and she’s lying in his arms, he feels an unwelcome stranger in the room.  He tests a breath, then another before he’s sure.  He excuses himself to the ‘fresher before she can tell he’s having a panic attack. 

Cold water on the eyes, hand steady on the hard counter, he concentrates on his breathing as he’d heard her advise others in times of crisis.  His gut clenches and releases, coming in waves, each one more violent than the one before.  But he won’t ask for help, he can’t.  He’s stronger than this.

Breathe in.  Breathe out.  _I’m safe.  I’m alone.  Nothing can hurt me here._

Repeat.

After what feels like an hour, the method works.  The ringing in his ears subsides.  He no longer feels the need to vomit.

When he returns to the bed, she’s already asleep.  The soft rhythm of her breathing makes quick work of breaking apart all remaining anxiety.  He pulls the covers up close to his chin, finally relaxes his jaw, and drifts off to an uninterrupted night’s sleep - the first one he’s had since murdering his crew.

* * *

With a slender hypo in one hand, he cups the other and traces a line down his forehead, settling just below the dip of his left eye socket.  He lines up the cylinder against the inside of his palm, pulls up his eyelid, holds his breath and releases the pressurized syringe.

The needle burns a hole and he bites down on his tongue to stifle the gasp.  He pauses a moment to regain his composure then repeats the procedure on the other side.

Just because this hasn’t worked so far, doesn’t mean he’ll give up trying.

A shiver runs through him when the medication reaches his optical nerves, he bites it back and reaches for the shirt she left him on the dresser.  He finds the bottom of it, and puts it over his head.  The neckline pushes past his nose, and he opens his eyes, but something is different.

Blinking rapidly, he can finally – _finally_ – see.  His retinas begin the agonizing process of finding their focus.  The brightness burns but he won’t look away, won’t cover his eyes. 

Still pained by this unexpected ability, he stares across the hall into the next room at her, unable – unwilling – to look away.  What he fears more than anything now is that she may fade into blackness once again.

“I’m leaving in a few minutes, Gabriel,” she says, pulling up what he can barely make out as a blue pants with a gold stripe.  “I left you breakfast on the table.  You’re due for your appointment in an hour.  I know better than to ask if you need anything else.”

“Thank… thank you,” he wavers, sitting down on the edge of the bed carefully.

There is a pause in her movement, a shrug as she puts on a very blurry uniform jacket and then her footsteps grow louder, her figure looms larger.  He blinks at least a dozen times and rubs at his eyes.

“You’re thanking me?” she jokes.  “Just because we slept together doesn’t mean you have to be polite, you know…”

She pauses her movement and he stares at her.  As if someone is turning a dial, she becomes incrementally more and more in focus until he realizes that she’s very close.

“Are you alright?”

He looks down to the hand she has placed on his leg, still unable to discern where her fingers stop and his bare thigh begins, but seeing them both.  He traces his gaze up the shadow of her arm, across her shoulder, wincing at the reflected light from her insignia only to drown in the way her brown hair contrasts with the paleness of her neck - grateful beyond reason for the ability to see anything but fiery explosion in front of a curtain of night.

“I’m fine,” he reassures them both.  “Everything will be fine now.”

* * *

**_Epilogue_**

**_Him_  **

There is a wall in middle of Federation Park. 

Surrounded by immaculately kept gardens, flanked by a fountain at each end, it rises from the ground, dark and foreboding.  Some fifty paces away is a playground.  On sunny days, parents watch their children play and remind them not to use the gigantic slabs of black granite as a place to bounce their balls.  But on rainy days, like this one, the swings and slides sit empty.  That irony is not lost on him as he walks past, head tucked down, with singular purpose.

The wall, ominous and strong, stretches along an equally massive path.  _Is gravity stronger here_ , he wonders, feet heavy.

Every ship, every station.  Every battle and accident, illness and disaster.  Every life that has been lost in the name of Starfleet ideals has been meticulously inscribed on this wall.  To look upon it gives the feeling that one has traveled an incalculable distance from San Francisco to the farthest reaches of the galaxy. 

Every cadet has been to this place to pay respects to those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of freedom and exploration.  Every newly-minted officer has looked at the empty space just past where the ledger stops, gazed into that mirrored surface, seen their own reflection, and imagined their own name inscribed beside those of roommates and friends, teachers and heroes.

And for each of them, at some point, the future becomes a stark reality.

It strikes him, as he passes another man at middle of the path, that even in terrible weather, the wall is rarely alone.  Someone is always there, remembering.  Grieving.

His uniform is all but soaked through as he stands before the latest set of engravings.  He can’t bring himself to mouth the name of his destructed vessel, instead he begins to recite the crew by heart, as if checking them against the record. 

_Aubrey, A’zext, Brown…_

His hair is soaked, dripping down his forehead and he wipes away the moisture from his newly-restored eyes.

_Dennison, D’Trag, Ekaa…_

He touches a fingertip to feel the texture of the G that begins the name of his former first officer, the name is still shaky off his tongue.

_Greyson…_

Just those two syllables are enough to thrust him back to that moment when his most trusted comrade fell down against him, blood warm soaking through his clothing like the rain. 

He remembers to breathe.  Now is not the time to lose control.

_Indujaa, Jemis, Jarrell…_

“Samson Jarrell,” he says aloud and with voicing the name he recalls how bitterly angry Sam’s mother had been when he contacted her the week before.  She barely heard what he had to say before ending the call.  “My only child,” she had told him.  “What gave you the right?”  Though he couldn’t yet see to commit her face to memory, somehow there was still an image of her burned there.  Ire and tears. 

_Martin, Maybach, Ming…_

This is his final goodbye, he realizes midway through the alphabet.  Though he’ll never forget – his eyes and heart will see to that – he is finally ready to move on.  He’s ready to exact revenge on their behalves.  It is the reason he survived, after all.  Nothing matters but this.

_Quinn, Radha, Tetek…_

A day’s journey away, _U.S.S. Discovery_ is waiting patiently for him to take command.  His new crew is hard at work readying the vessel for their new purpose.  Each of them poised to do their duty, ready to die if he gives the order.  But that won’t happen this time. 

_Williams, Veitch, Yr’uxa_

With one last exhale, he’s done.  He declares this part of his nightmare over; the ghosts of this crew will not be allowed to haunt him any longer.  In the bathing downpour he feels reborn with a new, singular purpose.

His complete attention disengages from the wall and now he hears the droplets as they patter on her umbrella behind him.  He feels her hand, reassuring on his shoulder, forever grateful that she ignored his protests and accompanied him. 

He knows she’s wary of him taking command.  She’s suspicious of his motives, his mental stability, and rightfully so.  He recognizes that if anything happens this time, guilt will fall squarely on her shoulders.

He’s determined to do everything possible to prove himself worthy of her confidence, he'll do whatever it takes to regain her trust.  Wearing the uniform has never felt more right.

He takes a step back, nods, and she reaches up to cover him from the rain.

“Let’s end this war.”

 


End file.
